


Madness in a Silken Thread

by limiculous



Category: Firefly, Serenity (2005)
Genre: F/F, F/M, Gen, Terminal Illnesses
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-04-28
Updated: 2012-05-23
Packaged: 2017-11-04 11:30:17
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 1,605
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/393319
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/limiculous/pseuds/limiculous
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What Inara wanted, and what she could never have.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. daughters

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: Not mine, none of it. The characters are Joss' and the title is Shakespeare's.

i

what genetics kept from her, part i

daughters

i

She knew what she wanted, always. Until she met Captain Reynolds.

Malcolm, who admired the smooth lines of the dress she wore— Malcolm, who showed teeth in the parody of a smile and called her a whore— Malcolm, who wore a new face every day—

Malcolm infuriated her.

But Inara wanted to give him children ( _any daughters_ —). She wanted to wake up next to him each morning and slide her fingers across each of his cheekbones. She wanted to become a true part of this little family, Mal's crew, even if it meant running from the law for the rest of her short life.

But that first one was the most persistent ( _any daughters you have_ —), and the images of children gifted with his warm eyes and smirk and reckless loyalty haunted her dreams at night.

But—

She wanted to kill him for making her feel this way ( _any daughters you have will be_

_just_

_like_

_you_ ).

i


	2. attention

ii

what her family kept from her, part i

attention

ii

When she was very young, all she had wanted was attention from someone. Mostly her mother, but anyone – a teacher, a passerby on the street – would have done. It didn't have to be much, just a pat on the back or a "good job" whispered in her ear when she got a question correct in class. She never got it. She would always be the too-tall daughter of a low-ranked Alliance official who made enough money to send his only child to an elite school, but never quite enough to buy her an a place in the social circles of any of the girls there. Her father was good enough that he could easily keep his job, but too much of a _pi gu_ with a superiority complex to ever rise above middle management. Her father was too busy creating work for others to spend time in an unwelcoming household.

The loneliness was worse with her mother, who spent most of her days in the house avoiding her own daughter. Inara never quite understood why her mother never paid her any attention. After all, weren't mothers supposed to love their children beyond all reason? She didn't understand for a long time why Madame Serra drank so much, and smoked so much, and why she brought so many young men back to the house and took them behind closed doors.

When her mother collapsed, Inara would call the paramedics, and then watch from the stairs as they slid the cold needles into the veins at the crook her of elbow. It had begun happening with regularity when Inara was nine, and her mother was just over fifty.

"Your mother is very sick," her father had said the first time it happened, ushering Inara to her room. "You know what to do next time." He had left the house then, his work for the Alliance more important than the well-being of his wife and daughter. That was the last night her parents acknowledged each other's existence.

ii


	3. hope

iii

what her family kept from her, part ii

hope

iii

The beautiful woman on her father's arm when she was six had trailed their clasped hands through the koi fountain in their home on Sihnon, the water droplets lingering diamonds in the evening light. "You are a beautiful girl, Inara," she had murmured, running her still wet fingers through the girl's hair. "Have you ever considered becoming a companion?"

Inara had shaken her head, eyes downcast. "Father says that companions are the most beautiful women in the world. I am not beautiful." She had shifted then, away from the impossibly lovely woman beside her, feeling her long, gawky limbs acutely.

But the woman's hand had unerringly followed her lowering chin and lifted it, fixing her with an intense stare. "You will be," she had told Inara, quiet conviction in her voice. She had pressed a data chip into Inara's hand. "When you're ready," she had whispered, so close that Inara could feel her warm breath fanning across her neck, "come to Madrassa. Contact me with this."

She had smiled back at Inara as she returned to the lights and dancing of the party. Inara had fingered the data chip, feeling the ghost of the beautiful companion's fingers on her hand, her cheek, her scalp. She had considered for a moment dropping the chip among the reeds and the koi, watching it sink to the bottom to be swallowed by the mud and grime, never to see it, never to have to _lose_ the hope that someday she might no longer be the ugly duckling _(because not having that hope in the first place is easier than having it wilt and die after nurturing it)_. She hadn't . She had crept up to her room and left it in her jewelry box under the cheap beads given to her in gen ed by her first and only friend. The beads were too cheap for her parents to ever deign to touch, and she knew that the data chip would never be discovered.

She forgot about it within the month.

iii


	4. longevity

iv

what genetics kept from her, part ii

longevity

iv

Most citizens of the Allied Planets look back on the medicine of Earth-That-Was with horror. The people there had only lived seventy years or so. When, in this day and age, living to be a hundred and forty is common place, that life span seems incredibly short.

Inara understands, and sometimes looks on that average with envy. After all, she'll be luck to live to sixty. With constant medical care in the best hospitals on Sihnon, she might live to meet that old average.

But Inara never wanted to live out the end of her life in sterile, white corridors. She wanted to see places beyond her home world, no matter how beautiful she thought it. Sihnon had never felt quite comfortable.

So when Nandi, her closest friend in House Madrassa left for the outer rim, unable to accept the cold warmth that is the Companion's smile, Inara followed her. Not immediately, and not exactly – she simply found herself drifting away from the House, taking jobs further and further away, until one day, she realized that she had accepted a job off planet and she needed to find a ship.

She took a cabin on an Alliance passenger cruiser, but found it just as sterile as the hospitals she avoided. So when, after a month, it made its way to the Eavesdown docks of Persephone, Inara left to find a place on a new ship.

Kaylee shone amidst the squalor, and Inara was drawn to her _(and her captain)_ like a moth to flames.

iv


	5. Closeness

v

what her training kept from her, part i

closeness

v

Kaylee, bright Kaylee, was terribly intimidated by Inara the first few months of the woman’s stay on the ship. It was understandable; Kaylee was as crude as Jayne, though far kinder in her judgments of people. She was born on the mid rim to a lower class family, had only the minimum education required by Alliance standards, and had only seen her home planet and the markets _Serenity_ docked near. Of course Kaylee would compare herself to the companion and, not being able to see her own beauty – both inner and outer, find herself lacking.

Inara saw this in Kaylee’s body language, heard it in her cheerful, but quavering greetings each morning. The older woman didn’t care about Kaylee’s coarseness; her sweet, caring personality was by far her best trait. Kaylee was a beautiful soul, and Inara had no interest in making the girl uncomfortable.

She hadn’t seen how lonely Kaylee was.

She hadn’t recognized that same loneliness in herself.

Inara found herself wandering through _Serenity_ late at night. Once, she saw Jayne sharpening knives in the kitchen, quiet, almost meditative in his focus. She left him undisturbed, moving slowly back to her shuttle, finding comfort in the sleeplessness of another person out in the black. 

Several times, she saw Wash and Zoe, on the bridge, or curled up in the common area. They sat with linked hands and soft eyes; the lust in relationships Inara was accustomed to was replaced with a comfortable, abiding love. The pair made her chest ache and her stomach twist with unacknowledged emotions. They, too, she slipped soundlessly away from, blinking back tears at the swelling loneliness.

She never saw Mal.

The last time she felt the need to wander for a long time, she found Kaylee just outside the engine room, sobbing. Before she could consciously work out what to do, Inara found herself kneeling in front of the girl, lifting Kaylee up and into her lap, rubbing slow circles into her back. The mechanic curled into Inara’s shoulder, and she could feel the tears soaking into the materials of her dress, the hushed smell of damp silk bringing up memories of Nandi holding her just this way in Inara’s first months at House Madrassa.

When Kaylee’s tears had all dried, Inara lifted the girl up and wordlessly led her back to the shuttle, back to soothing tea and incense, back to soft brushes and washcloths, back to listening ears and comforting arms.

Kaylee poured out her loneliness and fears and homesick grief into a quietly murmuring Inara’s lap, and fell asleep, secure in the knowledge that there was someone on _Serenity_ who understood and listened.

Inara fell just a bit in love with Kaylee, but shared nothing of herself but sympathy and support. Companions could not grow attached.


End file.
